


I remember the day you left for Santa Monica

by orphan_account



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: Abandonment, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Betrayal, F/F, Reminiscing, Songfic, id say “short and sweet” but it’s not quite sweet lol, slight touch on some, sorry this is a wee bit short
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:54:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28175730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Chloe continually wonders why Rachel had to like everyone else: leaving her in the end.(An AU in which Rachel never died and made it to Santa Monica…hopefully.)
Relationships: Rachel Amber/Chloe Price
Kudos: 4





	I remember the day you left for Santa Monica

**Author's Note:**

> This was a small story I wrote a couple of years ago and forgot about it until I found it in the notes of an old iPad. I’ve been replaying LiS recently so take this as a small celebration of me doing that lol
> 
> This fic was heavily inspired by the song “Santa Monica” by Theory of a Deadman!

One month. It’s been one month since Rachel left for Santa Monica. 

She was never happy with our simple, quiet life in small town Oregon and to tell the truth neither am I; but deep down I knew that I could never bring myself to leave no matter the situation, I have too many memories here both good and bad. Rachel on the other hand was prepared to bail at the first given opportunity and ever since we had met at the Firewalk concert we had been laying down a plan to leave Oregon and move to California. I didn’t even have an idea about what I would be doing once we moved there but Rachel on the other hand was hellbent on becoming an actress, and she definitely had the talent and determination to do so. The only thing that had been holding us back was my shitty truck that neither of us were sure could carry us all the way to Santa Monica and I had been in the process of looking for some sort of job to gather money to either fix it or buy a better car, but that never happened before she grew tired of waiting on me; I have yet to figure out if I’m more angry or heartbroken that Rachel would leave me behind like this. 

Maybe one day I’ll see her name on the front of a movie poster, I’ll watch the hell out of that movie and she better win at least one award for it. 

I can still feel the depression and betrayal in my chest from the day I came home and found her note on my bed. It felt like my bones were breaking as I read the two sentences, “I had to go on ahead. I’m so sorry that I couldn’t wait for you.” and I immediately tore the paper into as many pieces as possible before setting them on fire, while a fire of anger ignited itself inside of me. Ever since Max had left me the same day that I had to bury my dad, Rachel had been an angel that swept in and saved me from myself and I thought that that moment would last forever but I had been so fucking wrong. Looking back I’m wondering if someone had been trying to show us a sign of what was to come between my mom constantly worrying about me with Rachel, to Rachel’s parents wondering why she had chosen the school rebel of all people to want to spend the rest of her life with…but at the time we had both made up our minds and were fully certain that we knew what we had signed up for. 

Well her mind had been made up alright; just like that, literally overnight, Rachel and our love was gone. I just wish I knew the exact reason beyond “I can’t wait any longer”. 

My favorite moments with Rachel were the ones where we would walk to the cliff outside of town and sit by the lighthouse, drinking beer and talking about life and our future together…if only I had known then I was looking forward to something that would never happen. Now I’ll wake up and it’ll hurt to breathe knowing that I no longer have her next to me. 

“Don’t you wish that you were dead like me?” I remember her asking one day as we sat along the cliff. I was hella confused by her question as well, she was alive and talking to me on that bench as she rested her head on my lap. But looking back I think I know what she had really meant by that: not physically dead, but mentally and emotionally dead; feeling that she had no purpose here in Arcadia Bay. Knowing that she had to get the hell out of here, a feeling that now overwhelms me. Without thinking I start sifting through my closet until I find the backpack I had prepared for the day of our escape, filled with a few hundred dollars and around a week’s worth of clothes and run out to my shitty truck but as I seat myself inside, reality suddenly hits me. Perhaps I had never been meant to reach Santa Monica, that it was solely Rachel’s fate; meanwhile I was meant to remain here in shitty small town Oregon by myself. 

Just like everyone else in my life, Rachel was only temporary. 

I can’t stop the screams and tears that overwhelm me as I sit and wonder once again why Rachel decided to leave me behind, wishing the memories would stop flooding my mind and go away. I want to be angry at her for leaving me to pursue her Santa Monica dream like I had been angry at my father for dying, angry at Max for leaving me alone much like Rachel has now. But something prevents me from being angry, as if I’ve spent so much of my teenage years being angry at everyone for everything that I’ve literally run out of anger to give. Maybe it is time to move on with my life, even if it hurts me to do so. I just hope that wherever Rachel ends up in life she’s surrounded by the love, fame, and fortune that she deserves. If I’m lucky, then one day she’ll randomly remember me and reach out and maybe we can start over.


End file.
